Good morning, friends! Welcome back to the Kicks You Wear. Thanks so much for reading today. Appreciate you giving me a bit of your time. Happy Tuesday! Hope you had a fantastic weekend.
Pulled off the Mr. Johnson Halloween costume. As it turns out, a bald guy being another bald guy for Halloween is a pretty easy thing to do! Making note of that for next year. You’d better watch out, Common. I’m coming for you.
We’ve got a packed newsletter today, so let’s just jump right in.
Amiri Does Sports
Mike Amiri’s namesake brand made its way in the fashion world by breaking the rules. Amiri took the aesthetics of rock ‘n’ roll and fused it with contemporary streetwear to create a unique look that dominated the late 2010s and early 2020s in the luxury space.
Like any successful brand, though, Amiri hasn’t rested on its laurels. It’s expanded beyond its denim-dominated approach over the last few years and has experimented with more formal looks. That brings us to this conversation today.
Amiri and FC Barcelona have agreed to a deal, making the fashion label the official formalwear partner for the club’s men’s and women’s teams, starting with the 2025 Winter season. While Amiri has dabbled in sports before by forging athlete partnerships with the likes of NFL star Travis Kelce and boxing star Canelo Alvarez, this is by far the biggest deal the brand has had in the space.
I had the opportunity to speak with Amiri himself about the move. Just a couple of Mikes chopping it up! We discussed the partnership, why sports are essential for the fashion industry these days and what it signals for the brand’s future.
Below is our conversation. Enjoy!
Mike Sykes: You’ve worked in sports before with names like Travis Kelce and Canelo Alvarez. This FC Barcelona deal is bigger than just an individual player. What opportunity do you see here?
Mike Amiri: Whether it’s music or film or even sport, we kind of look for some sort of shared affinity, or some sort of shared value.
When looking at this opportunity — which is probably the biggest thing we could do, and one of the biggest teams in the world — it was looking at how they were investing in the team and structuring it. They have these young players kind of mixed with these seasoned players. Respecting the old but also building on the new. That felt really compelling to me. Amiri is, in many ways, a young brand, even though we’re 12 years in. But we’re quite new when you talk about heritage, luxury and all these big brands that we kind of sit along with. I really enjoyed that parallel.
And aside from that, a few of the players already wore Amiri. It was really organic. The president of the club, Joan Laporta, requested that we were approached for this, which really made it special. It wasn’t something we chased — it’s something we attracted, which is something I’ve learned to really appreciate.
Sykes: One of the things I found so interesting with this was that this was Amiri with a rock ‘n’ roll Americana vibe working with a classic La Liga team. To me, it kind of came out of left field. But it sounds like you were already familiar with the team?
Amiri: In the last six or seven years, we’ve just taken the mindset of trying something new and brought it into formal wear and into tailoring. It’s kind of brought a new bit of swagger you would see, not only on the red carpet, on the stage, but in the tunnels. I think, little by little, it lined up to where they were going with the club.
I could see how it is kind of left field — especially given that, you look at the other teams, they’re all with these heritage luxury houses. So this feels, in some ways, almost like a perfect match given where [FC Barcelona is] going.
Sykes: Amiri has always been different from those heritage brands. How do you envision yourself bringing that to this partnership? Especially in a sport like global football, where it can sometimes be so entrenched in tradition.
Amiri: Number one, you want these guys to look good, you know? It’s the same thing whether you’re working with a team or a person. You want it to be something that people feel good in. You don’t want to push it to a place where it’s too much, but you do want a little bit of swagger and modernity there.
So in some of the shapes, we’ve given a little bit of shape to the trousers. We’ve given a little bit of volume in some of the outerwear. We’ve mixed that with some heritage fabrics and heritage pinstripes and things like that. Just these small tweaks to make it feel a bit more modern, respecting the foundations of men’s tailoring but also bringing in kind of a more youthful approach in how you wear a suit.
Sykes: You’ve been able to spread your brand, to this point, without tapping into the stage of sports. Why is this the right time for this deal with FC Barcelona?
Amiri: In many ways, I could say we have done it without that. But in many ways, I can say we’ve done it with [sports]. Culture has been a very, very, very important part of Amiri’s growth. To me, sports is part of culture. I think culture was very much a part of our success and the fact that we tapped into a certain energy and built off it.
You know, I was never one to shy away from the tunnels when I think a lot of big luxury houses didn’t want to dress people for the tunnels. And I thought, “This is the main stage to the world right now.” A lot of these young players, they’re dictating what’s fashion. And we were kind of that tunnel brand for a bit, which now you see these big endorsement deals for players just walking through the tunnel. So, in many ways, I have to credit sports as something that connects culture and global culture as part of our success story.
Amiri has gone from this American brand to now something that’s bubbling globally, whether it’s in Europe or through our Paris shows or whether it’s the Middle East or Latin America. We’re just having this huge following grow. We’ve become a global brand. In many ways, Barcelona is the world’s brand. It’s almost appropriate to where we’re going for this next five to 10 years of Amiri.
Sykes: Do you see sports as an avenue for some of these heritage brands to potentially reset themselves as fashion continues to evolve?
Amiri: There’s always an opportunity to find brand heat with those connections. But the modern generation sees through everything. They look for authenticity and why something makes sense. It’s really important for there to be a true synergy — a true partnership — where it’s more of a conversation between both and less of a brand deal. That’s why I talked about how I like that [FC Barcelona], in some ways, is a very young team that has experienced players. They respect the foundation of the club, but they’re also building on it. That’s how I see Amiri within our landscape as well.
Sykes: Do you see the current landscape of sports partnerships as a bubble with potential to burst or do you think there’s a long tail there?
Amiri: Sports will become one of the most important things in culture in the next 10 years. In a world where you can’t see what’s real all the time from your screen and you’re starting to kind of doubt visual things and it’s divided, you need something to connect you to reality. You need something to be a part of and to share something with someone.
I think sports gives you that opportunity quite uniquely.
Lei’s NYC Marathon Thought Bubble
Big big big shoutouts to BoF superstar Lei Takanashi, who ran in the New York City Marathon over the weekend. This dude is a beast. He somehow had the wherewithal to share some of his thoughts on the brands present at the race
Today, with more people running than ever before, the New York City Marathon has become a tentpole event that feels akin to fashion week for the Garmin watch set.
And being someone who ran their first New York City marathon on Sunday (and is a sucker for limited-edition drops by virtue of being a streetwear geek), I was fully committed to searching for the best marathon merch last week.
This search started at the marathon expo, which is where runners pick up their bibs for the race and explore what’s essentially ComplexCon for all things running. New Balance held the largest presence at this event due to being the main sportswear sponsor for the race since 2015. Surprisingly, Hoka, Asics, Adidas and Saucony were also selling their own commemorative marathon merch and footwear at the expo.
Truthfully, this merch wasn’t that interesting. It looked like something you could cop at a local Dick’s Sporting Goods.
Outside of the expo indie sportswear brands like Currently Running, Soar and Miler Running, set up pop-ups that were more up my alley. The one that arguably garnered the most hype last week though was by Bandit Running. When it opened on Thursday, customers lined-up in the pouring rain to be the first to shop a marathon-themed capsule collection inside a shop that looked like it was pulled directly from the set of Blade Runner. The pop-up experience alone convinced me to buy another piece of Bandit Running clothing — beyond the pieces I planned to wear on race day.
Surprisingly, the one sportswear brand completely absent from the expo, but seemed fully invested in addressing more fashion-forward running customers, was Nike. Last week, the brand energised its new Vomero Premium running sneaker by unveiling two surprising collaborations. One was with the New York-based designer Melitta Baumeister, a CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund winner who unveiled her take on the performance-running sneaker through an immersive art-installation in Chelsea.
A bit further downtown, Nike also unveiled a Vomero Premium and Air Force 1 collaboration with Homerun — a Brooklyn-based label that’s gained so much traction within New York’s streetwear scene in less than two years that it released a collaborative capsule with Supreme in May. The sneakers were only given to “friends and family” and unveiled at a multi-day pop-up organised alongside Mental Athletic, a bi-annual print magazine centred on contemporary running culture that also released its latest issue that week. At the end of a shakeout run organised by all three parties on Saturday, over 100 runners flooded its pop-up to create custom Nike running kits — myself included.
Did I seriously wait nearly five hours to get a custom T-shirt a day before running a marathon? Yes. It was absolutely worth it to have a piece of NYC Marathon merch that nearly no one else would have.
The Travis Scott Test
It’s been quite a while since a Travis Scott and Nike collaboration was the centre of attention. I have a feeling that’s about to change soon.
What’s happening: Hiroshi Fujiwara’s Fragment brand is collaborating with Travis Scott and Nike on a pair of Jordan 1 lows set to release this month in that signature blue and white colourway.
- It features all of the bells and whistles a Travis Scott collaboration typically does. The reverse swoosh, wax laces, Cactus Jack branding.
- The Fragment lightning bolt logo will also be featured on the heel of the shoe, according to photos from the Cactus Jack Instagram.
Why this matters: You have to wonder how this shoe will be received. This shouldn’t feel like a slam dunk. People are tired of the Air Jordan 1. Travis Scott’s shtick feels a bit played out, too. This shoe is an automatic hit in 2021. It feels like less of a guarantee in 2025.
Yet, still, signs point to this sneaker likely blowing up.
The why: This shoe works because of its history. Travis Scott and Fragment both have a history as hit Nike collaborators. They’ve also already released two hit Air Jordan 1 models together. The most dedicated sneaker collectors want to complete the pack. The uninitiated recognise the collab and want to be part of the moment.
The other side: If this doesn’t work (and chances are slim that it won’t), a lot of reckoning that will need to be done. It’d be the mark of the true end for the Air Jordan 1’s run. The Swoosh’s Travis Scott era would be up in the air. Nike would really have to look itself in the mirror and ask what the future of that partnership looks like.
Those are huge “if’s” though. Right now, there’s no reason to worry.
The bottom line: There aren’t many white whale sneakers in today’s ecosystem, but this definitely seems to be one of them. Good luck if you want these. You’ll likely need it.
What’s Droppin’, bruh?
This is a dedicated section detailing upcoming sneaker releases for the week, and sometimes other interesting drops I think you might care about.
Thanks for reading, gang! Hope you enjoyed the newsletter.
If you have any questions, comments or concerns, reach out to me via email at michael.sykes@businessoffashion.com or shoot me a message @MikeDSykes via socials.
Peace and love. Be safe, be easy, be kind. We out.
-Sykes 💯
